From 0 to 60 in Less Than a Second
by NeoNails
Summary: First introductions can be pretty awkward, but they're even worse when you've already made a bad impression on the person beforehand. Warren/Layla oneshot.


To celebrate the fact that I've just successfully finished/posted all of the chapters in my very first _Sky High_ fanfic, _Breaking Hearts & Making Changes_, I decided to post this little oneshot/drabble-y thing I wrote shortly after completing the aforementioned chaptered fic.

It's possible this kind of plot line has been seen before, but I tried to be as creative as possible and give it my own, 100 percent original feel.

4

It's amazing how quickly a mind can shift gears in only a span of a few seconds.

With the obvious exception of Sky High, Warren Peace spent a majority of his time either at home with his mother or at work. It was the latter of which he had been spending this particular night. He worked as a busboy for the local Chinese restaurant, the Paper Lantern, where he got a very decent pay for carting around dirty dishes.

His night was going on like any of the others when he worked there, until his boss, Mrs. Chang, told him to go talk to their last customer. Apparently, the customer had been there for several hours, and while they had ordered their food, they still hadn't left. There wasn't anyone else left in the restaurant, and everyone wanted to go home at this point.

Warren told Mrs. Chang in her native tongue of Mandarin that he would speak to this customer and send them on their way. Mrs. Chang waved her hands and shooed him in the table's direction, wanting the customer out of her restaurant as soon as possible. The old lady had work to do, and she didn't want to be held back.

As he walked up to the table, still scrubbing an empty plastic pitcher with an old rag, he realized he made an incorrect assumption. He had assumed that the customer was male; it was probably a sexist assumption, but it was there all the same. So he was pretty surprised to see this lone customer was undeniably female.

Even from the back, her copper hair shined like a beacon in the restaurant's dim lights. He couldn't see her expression from this angle, but judging by the way her head was bowed and how she seemed to be dejectedly pushing around the uneaten plate of food that sat before her, he guessed she wasn't in the best of moods.

He stepped front of her table and she finally looked up. "You gonna finish that?" he asked, gesturing to her plate. There was a pause when the two stared at one another, and Warren couldn't stop himself from studying her face closer. She looked vaguely familiar, but that just meant she was probably a repeat customer at the Paper Lantern.

This girl was undeniably pretty- even he could admit that. She was pretty in that natural way, that only a few girls could pull off. The coppery hair that he'd first noticed only served to compliment her pale, oval shaped face. Her round, soft brown doe eyes widened and her heart-shaped mouth was still curved downward into a pout. This pout only held up for a few seconds, and then it split into a warm, toothy grin.

Warren had a few girlfriends in the past few years, if that was hard to believe. Though, he hadn't had a girlfriend since his father was thrown away in prison, and he and mother were forced to make due on their own. He'd decided dating was a waste of his time, which he needed in order to help his mother make ends meet. But something about this sweet smile and open face made him reconsider his past decision.

"Hey," she said softly. She looked up at him expectantly, as though waiting for his reaction and response.

"Hey," he replied smartly, barely smiling. His eyebrows furrowed slightly in confusion. Did she think they knew one another? Not that he minded- he'd go along with her little delusion if she continued to smile like that.

Her smile faltered slightly. "We go to school together?" she explained quietly, a slight blush blooming on her cheeks, as though suddenly ashamed to admit it.

On the outside, Warren hardly reacted. Inside, he was pretty damn surprised. Why was he only now just noticing this redheaded hottie (for lack of a better- i.e. less _ironic_- pun)?

Then, suddenly, it all came crashing down on him like a ton of bricks, as those damned gears in his brain finally started cranking. He _did_ know this girl. She was… She was…

"You're one of Stronghold's friends."

It wasn't until she nodded that he finally realized he'd said that precise phrase aloud. He didn't bother worrying about it. He was too busy cursing his luck. Of course, this pretty redhead would be friends with Stronghold. Why not? The guy had everything else. A perfect, normal family, superheroic strength like his father, the attention of Grayson and the rest of the idiot "in-crowd" heroes… Why not a lovely little girlfriend to tie it all up in a perfect friggin' bow?

He remembered her now. She was the one that stood up to him when he was about to kick Stronghold's ass. She and the rest of Stronghold's little sidekick buddies had stood next to her, and she had even tried to get him to leave the freshman alone.

It figured. That was just his luck. He was always good at making enemies with the wrong people. It was a shame, too. Because she was really cute.

Warren tried not to feel disappointed. He nodded back distractedly, setting his jaw as he noticed her food once more. Leaning closer, he asked, "Do you want me to heat that up for you?"

Her doe eyes widened a bit more and she leaned forward, her voice dropping to a whisper, "We're not supposed to use our powers out of high school."

One side of his mouth quirked up in a half-smile at that. She automatically assumed he intended to use his pyrokinetic powers to heat up her food.

"I was just going to put it in the microwave," he replied, mocking the same hushed tone she had just used on him.

Her pale cheeks bloomed with color at this, and she smiled, mostly embarrassedly.

She ended up offering him a seat at her table, which he took, albeit reluctantly. They ended up talking for about a half an hour, mostly her just blathering on about (who else?) Stronghold. While he didn't care much for her choice in subject, but he found he couldn't stop listening to her. She just had such a warm, bubbly personality. She was just so alive and happy he couldn't tear his eyes off of her, even when she started rambling on about lima beans and her powers.

At one point, he did break down and finally ask her about her _obvious_ infatuation with that Stronghold tool. She only halfheartedly denied his accusation, and then finally admitted to the crush and started rambling once more.

Warren didn't have the slightest clue that, barely a month later, this girl, this Layla, would be one of his closest friends and a stable rock in his life when it felt like everything else was crumbling around him.

This pretty redhead would stick with him, after he finally graduated and stumbled out into the real world, unsure of which path to take: hero or villain. She would stay even after she and Will eventually broke up, despite the fact that most girls would've eschewed their ex's best friends.

And even after that, four years after high school, and when she moved three states away, she would studiously keep up contact with him. And when he turned twenty-five, she would visit him and present him with a birthday present- a scrapbook, about twenty pages thick, of all of the articles and snippets of his more infamous exploits as a superhero.

She would also be there, six months later, when he dropped to one knee and asked for her hand in marriage.

To which she would say yes.

4

This initially started as a burst of inspiration à la re-watching the Sky High movie last night on the ABC Family channel. I was going to make it even shorter than it currently is, stopping somewhere around the "You're one of Stronghold's friends" part. But then inspiration hit _again_ and I was left writing this unabashedly cotton-candy-sweet oneshot. Can I just take this moment to say I've _never_ written something like this.

Though, I will wholly admit, I think I like this one the best of all of the oneshots I've written for the Sky High Pit. It turned out almost exactly as I wanted it to. Maybe even better.


End file.
